Toyota has revealed that it will debut a new full-electric SUV in 2021. The details about the new EV are scant but it will be built on the company’s new e-TNGA platform. In terms of size, it will be similar to the current RAV4. Toyota aims to focus on the European market with the new electric SUV which is yet to be named. Toyota believes that a compact SUV can accommodate the needs of most regions in which the company operates and there are more volumes in that segment. The new battery-electric SUV will be one of the first of six EVs to be coming from the e-TNGA platform.
Koji Toyoshima, Deputy Chief Officer, ZEV Factory, Toyota Motor Corporation, said, “Toyota will shortly take the next step in the rollout of its forthcoming battery-electric portfolio by first previewing an all-new mid-sized SUV in the coming months. The versatility and flexibility of e-TNGA technology allows us to design and create vehicles that are not just battery-electric, but also exciting to drive and beautiful to look at.”
The new platform gets a clever design and Toyota says it is both highly versatile and easily adaptable for a range of product types. The basic architecture principle is that a number of key elements remain fixed whilst others vary. This allows the company to bring in variance in different parameters such as vehicle width, length, wheelbase and height. The e-TNGA platform can accommodate front, rear or four-wheel drive layouts. With a wide-range of battery and electric motor capacities that can be adapted to suit various vehicle types and usage profiles, Toyota is likely to use this platform increasingly in the near future. The development time of different model variants can be reduced and individual models can be developed in parallel to each other.